Authorities slaughtered sheep on a farm in southern England Monday as they tested for a suspected new case of foot-and-mouth disease, officials said.

Britain’s environment department said initial blood tests suggested the animals had been infected with the disease, which struck cattle and sheep on farms close to a medical research laboratory in two separate outbreaks over the past six weeks.

The latest suspected case is inside a nearly two-mile protection zone set up around the site of an outbreak last week in Surrey, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said.

“All animals on the premises are being slaughtered on suspicion,” the department said in a statement. “Further laboratory tests are ongoing.”

Veterinarians confirmed that the two cases of foot-and-mouth detected last week were the same strain found at three other locations during an outbreak that began Aug. 3.

The August outbreak was centered near the government-funded Institute for Animal Health, a diagnostic laboratory, and Merial Animal Health, a British unit of the U.S.-French pharmaceutical firm Merial Ltd. It prompted authorities to slaughter about 600 animals and suspend exports of livestock, meat and milk products for nearly three weeks.

An outbreak of the disease in 2001 led to the slaughter of thousands of animals in huge pyres across the country and millions in lost revenue to British farmers.